


That Thorns Have Roses

by badcaseofcasey



Series: A Very Check, Please! Valentine's Day [1]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Bitty makes cake for once, Jack is weak for fundraising, M/M, Rose-grams, They're both oblivious, Valentine's Day, as always
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-14
Updated: 2017-02-14
Packaged: 2018-09-24 12:25:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9726812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badcaseofcasey/pseuds/badcaseofcasey
Summary: “Some people grumble that roses have thorns;I am grateful that thorns have roses.”― Alphonse Karr, A Tour Round My GardenJack buys Bitty a rose from one of the clubs on campus. It isn't until later that he realizes what that might mean. So of course, he tries to cover it up by buying roses for the rest of the Samwell Men's Hockey team.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Valentine's Day everybody! My gift to you is oblivious hockey boys being cute!
> 
> An enormous amount of thanks to my friend and beta @theratchild for getting me through this so that I actually finished by Valentine's Day. 
> 
> I'm over on tumblr at exhibit-no-restraint if you want to see me rant and rave about these boys on a more regular basis.
> 
> Disclaimer: all of these characters, as well as the amazing creation that is Check, Please!, belong to ngozi and I'm so lucky to be able to borrow them for a while.

Jack didn’t really put that much thought into doing nice things for Bitty. It was just something that happened. He was at the farmer’s market and saw some beautifully ripe apples and he thought  _ Bitty would like these _ , so bought a bushel. He was walking around campus and saw the light filtering through autumn leaves and thought  _ Bitty would think this was pretty _ , so he took a picture to show Bitty later. The point is that the sky is blue, grass is green and Jack Zimmermann does nice things for Eric BIttle without thinking about the consequences.

So when Jack saw the booth selling roses for Valentine’s Day on his way to class, he thought  _ Bitty would like getting a rose _ , and thought nothing of walking over to buy a rose for Bittle. It was for a good cause, and it would make Bittle happy, which in turn made everyone else happy.

It wasn’t until 20 minutes later, in the middle of his class on the History of Human Rights, that Jack realized that buying a platonic friend a rose wasn’t the kind of thing normal people did. A guy didn’t send his friend a red rose for Valentine’s Day just to make him smile. To be honest, a normal guy didn’t do  _ any _ of the things that Jack found himself doing for Bitty on a regular basis, but that was different because this was a  _ rose _ on  _ Valentine’s Day _ and the guys would chirp him for it endlessly if they found out.

So Jack did what any sensible captain of a hockey team who didn’t want to come to terms with his crush on one of his players would do: he went straight back to the table after class and bought a rose for every single member of the Samwell Men’s Hockey team.

___

The roses started coming the Monday before Valentine’s Day and it became the topic of conversation in the Haus and the SMH group text for the rest of the week. They were delivered during whichever class Jack had remembered the time of, which meant that they were scattered across the week. Shitty’s came in his Monday morning Men and Masculinities seminar, which led to him and the rest of the class debating the cultural and societal concepts surrounding a guy giving his best bro a rose. Dex’s came in the middle of his Program and Data Representation class and went almost entirely unnoticed by half of the class, including the professor. Chowder’s came halfway through his Chinese class and the teacher made him translate the message into Chinese and read it to the class. Ransom and Holster started compiling an excel spreadsheet codifying the various reactions of classmates to try and predict what would happen when each subsequent rose showed up. And Jack had never regretted anything more than sending these goddamn roses.

“Jack, bro,” Shitty said one night over Haus dinner. “Did you send everyone on the team a rose? You romantic motherfucker.”

“Oh shit,” Nursey said. “You guys got roses too? I thought it was for my birthday.”

“Nurse, shut the fuck up,” Dex said. “Just because you have the most predictable birthday ever doesn’t mean that everyone is going to send you valentines.”

“Dude, chill,” Nursey smirked over at Dex, but he didn’t take the bait.

“Don’t distract me,” Shitty said, pointing at Nurse and narrowing his eyes. “We’re supposed to be chirping the one and only Jack Zimmermann, hockey robot, who seems to have purchased a veritable garden-full of roses for his bros and expects us not to make a big deal out of it.”

Jack felt his cheeks get hot and shrugged. “What, a captain can’t make sure his team feels appreciated around Valentine’s Day?”

“The ridiculous social construct that it is aside,” Shitty said, looking at Jack appraisingly, “Valentine’s Day is traditionally reserved for declarations of romantic love. This isn’t like, Administrative Professionals Day or some shit.”

Ransom swings his laptop around to face the rest of the group. “The spreadsheet does show that one of the most common reactions to a rose delivery to a member of the hockey team is to wonder whether or not Jack is dating the recipient.”

“Dude, do people think Jack is dating all of us?” Dex asked, eyebrows raised.

“What, worried that people might think you’re gay?” Nurse said, smirking in a way that said he was saying it just to mess with Dex.

“I’m getting real tired of you saying shit like that, Nurse,” Dex said, his glare searing across the room.

“Come on, we all know that everyone’s a little bit gay for Jack Zimmermann,” Shitty said to murmurs of agreement, clearly trying to diffuse the tension.

Jack was starting to consider whether they would notice if he just quietly edged his way out of the room when Dex’s next comment made certain that no one would miss him.

“Or maybe it's because I'm gay and it's super fucking rude to act like I'm some kind of homophobic asshole all the time.”

There was a brief pause before the kitchen erupted into chatter and cheers. Shitty could be heard above it all proclaiming the importance of inclusivity and not making assumptions based on one’s laptop stickers. Nursey was uncharacteristically quiet and and for some reason, Jack didn’t think the blush on his cheeks had anything to do with embarrassment. 

The front door opened and Bitty walked into the kitchen, arms full of grocery bags, as Ransom and Holster grabbed Dex around the neck and gave him a noogie. He would be surprised but this was only about the 10th strangest thing he had come home to since moving into the Haus.

“Bits! You missed it!” Chowder said excitedly. “Dex totally shut Nursey down!”

“William Poindexter, you beautiful motherfucker,” Shitty said, wiping tears from the corner of his eyes.   
Jack made eye contact with Bitty, smiled, then used the commotion to sneak up to his room and hopefully get out of ever having to explain that he bought the roses just because he thought it would make Bitty happy.

___

Valentine’s Day dawned bright and cold, the sun glinting off of the piles of snow scattered around campus. Jack had gotten up early to run through campus in the still of the early morning and got back to the Haus just in time to see Bitty leaving, stifling a yawn.

“Morning, Bittle,” Jack said, jogging up the stairs.

“Morning,” Bitty said around a yawn. “Remind me again why I signed up for a class with a lab at 8am on a Saturday?”

“Because it was one of the only classes about food that you hadn’t taken yet?” Jack chirped, pulling each foot back behind him in turn to stretch out his legs. “And because they need kitchens that are in use the rest of the week?”

“Excuse you, Mr. Zimmermann, but I seem to remember you taking one of those classes about food yourself just last semester.”

“I only took it because I knew it would guarantee me some of whatever you baked for an entire semester,” Jack said, smirking. That  _ was _ part of the reason, but Jack would never admit to Bitty that the real reason was so that he could spend more time getting to know him.

“Using me for my baked goods, I should’ve known.” Bitty shook his head and walked down the front steps. “What are you even doing up? Did you go on a run already? You’re doing senior spring wrong.”

Jack shook his head and smiled to himself as Bitty headed down the stairs. “Have a good day, Bittle!”

Bitty’s halfhearted grumble barely reached Jack’s ears, but it’s enough to make him laugh as he shuts the door of the Haus behind him.

Jack walks into the kitchen to grab some water only to jump out of his skin when he hears someone clear their throat behind him.

“Jesus, Shitty!” Jack said, clutching his heart. “You nearly gave me a heart attack.”

“I do live here, you know,” Shitty said, sipping at the cappuccino that he had somehow acquired while still in his bathrobe with a newspaper spread out on the table in front of him. The sight would have been completely normal in a 3-bedroom home in the suburbs, but in the Haus, and with it being Shitty, it all felt sort of wrong. “At least for the next 3 months before I move out and enter the purgatory that is law school.”

“No one’s ever up this early,” Jack said, drinking his water to help slow his rapidly beating heart.

“I wanted to catch you before anyone else was awake,” Shitty said, setting down his coffee and steepling his fingers against his mouth. “We need to talk about your quest to turn the Samwell Men’s Hockey Team into your own personal season of The Bachelor.”

Jack stared for a moment. “What?”

“Oh, forgive me, I forgot about your utter lack of pop culture knowledge for a second,” Shitty chirped, smiling and shaking his head, “Why did you send everybody roses for Valentine’s Day?”

Jack groaned out loud. “I thought you’d dropped this.”

“You think I bought the excuse that you just wanted us to ‘feel appreciated’?” Shitty asks. “I know you better than that; you’re a nice guy, Jack, but you’re not that nice. That is some Eric Bittle level Southern Hospitality, right there.”

At the sound of Bitty’s name, Jack’s blush deepened. He was hoping Shitty wouldn’t notice, but he should have known better.

“Dude, this was all for Bitty?” Shitty asked, his expression softening. “I mean, I know you’re practically in love with the guy at this point, but how is giving everyone on the team a rose good for Bitty?”

Jack sighed, realizing he wasn’t going to be able to avoid this conversation. “It wasn’t supposed to be everyone. I just bought Bittle’s and then I realized that would be weird, so I dunno, I decided to make it a team thing. It was for a good cause.”

“Which makes it not weird, obviously,” Shitty said, his tone dripping in sarcasm. “Look, brah, I don’t want to tell you how to live your life, but maybe if you want to buy Bittle a rose, you just do it and then let the chips fall where they may. He at least seems to tolerate your presence.”

Jack sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “I’m not even sure why I bought Bittle that rose. It just happens sometimes, you know? I see something and it reminds me of Bittle and I want to get it for him, or take a picture for him, so I do. I’m not thinking I’m going to like, get anything out of it.”

“You’re allowed to have nice things, Jack,” Shitty said, looking at him intently. “Bitty lights up whenever you walk in the room. He somehow knows and anticipates when you’re going to have a stressful day and has pies ready for you when you get home. He put up with your horrible cooking skills and did that final project with you last year and didn’t even chirp you when your lattice was all over the fucking place.”

“But he does that kind of stuff for everyone,” Jack argued, shaking his head. “It’s not like I’m the only one he bakes for. He’s from the south, people are nicer there.”

“Look, if you don’t want to accept it, fine. But Bitty is super into you, so maybe you should just get your shit together and do something about it before we graduate and you still haven’t told him how you feel. Up to you.” With that, Shitty collected his coffee cup and newspaper and traipsed up the stairs, leaving Jack alone in the kitchen with his thoughts.

Jack took a swig from his water bottle, hoping the cool water would calm down the red in his cheeks. As he followed Shitty up the stairs, he started to regret ever buying that rose for BItty and tried not to imagine what would happen when Bitty got his rose in class today.

___

“Jack Laurent Zimmermann, you’d better be decent,” Bitty’s voice echoed from the hallway as the door to Jack’s room burst open.

Jack paused halfway dressed after his shower, shirt held in his hands as he looked up to see Bitty marching into his room, backpack still on, a single red rose in his hand.

“Oh lord, this just isn’t fair,” Bitty said, rolling his eyes to the ceiling. “We all know your abs are perfect, Jack, you don’t have anything to prove.”

Jack felt his cheeks color at the half-hearted chirp as he pulled his shirt over his head. “How was class?” Jack asked, trying desperately to avoid discussing the rose.

“How was class, he says,” Bitty says, looking back at Jack now that he was fully clothed. “Class was excellent, until someone came in and handed out roses. One for me, and one for another girl from her fiancé.”

It was Jack’s turn to refuse to look at Bitty. This was the moment he’d been worried about ever since he realized how weird it was that he bought Bitty a rose.

“Jack,” Bitty said, his voice soft, but exasperated. “Why did you get me a rose for Valentine’s Day?”

“I got them for all the guys,” Jack mumbled, but the excuse sounded feeble now that it came down to actually explaining it.

“Okay, sure,” Bitty said, his voice calm despite the fact that the rose was shaking gently in his hand. “But why is mine the only one without a note?”

Jack froze, eyes wide. In his haste to cover up his mistake in sending Bitty a rose, he’d forgotten that he hadn’t included a note. All of the other guys had gotten the same note, telling him that he appreciated all of their hard work for the team this year. Surely, Bitty had to know that the whole team appreciated him, Jack especially, even without a note.

“I don’t- I didn’t-” He fumbled for the right words, but they wouldn’t come. He could only focus on the flush high in Bitty’s cheeks and the way his eyes shone with determination.

Bitty waited for Jack to answer for what felt like ages, Jack desperately trying to find a way to explain that didn’t completely give him away. He clearly decided he’d waited long enough, because he threw up his hands and said, “You think about that. I have a birthday cake to bake.,” before stomping across the hall, dropping off his bag and heading downstairs to the kitchen.

___

Bitty was downstairs mixing up cake batter while the filling for the cherry tarts simmered on the stove. Nursey might try to act cool, calm, and collected at all times, but Bitty knew that he liked when people made a fuss for his birthday. He also knew that Derek really leaned into the whole Valentine’s Day theme, so he was mixing up a strawberry sheet cake, one of his old favorites that his mom had made for him growing up.

He was pouring the jell-o into the mixing bowl when Dex came into the kitchen, looking around carefully.

“Hey Bits,” he said, clearly going for cheerful. “Anyone else around?”

“Nope, just me and the sweets,” Bitty said, “Ransom and Holster went to grab the keg for tonight, Shitty, Lardo and Jack are all upstairs, and Nurse and Chowder said something about there being truffles in one of the dining halls today. What’s up?”

Dex sat heavily in one of the chairs, dropping his arms on the table and resting his forehead on them.

“Hard day?” Bitty guessed, trying not to push. “That was quite the announcement you made the other day. Seems to have surprised a lot of the guys in the house.”

Dex hummed into his arms in agreement. His shoulders were still tense, but Bitty could see him starting to relax. “It didn’t surprise you?”

“I’ve learned to expect the unexpected around here. Is that what’s making today hard?” he guessed, keeping his attention on the cake to try and stop Dex from feeling like he was on the spot.

“Yeah, I guess,” Dex said, lifting his head to rest his chin on his arms. “I mean - it’s my first Valentine’s Day that I’m out, and that’s enough but then…there’s this other thing, on top of that.”

Bitty shook his head and smiled. “You’re going to have to be a bit more specific if you want my advice.”

Dex, to his credit, didn’t even try and act like Bitty’s advice wasn’t what he had come there for in the first place. “I may have a crush… on a teammate,” he said quietly, looking down at his hands.

“And you think I might know something about that?” Bitty chirped, smirking.

“Oh, no, I didn’t mean to imply-” Dex said, sat up straight, eyes wide and staring at Bitty.

He waved a hand. “I’m just messing with you. I do, actually; know how it feels, I mean.”

Dex’s shoulders relaxed and he looked back at his hands. “It’s just, how do you get through it? He and I, we spend so much time together. Our dorms are right next door to each other, so we walk like, everywhere together, and we play together and eat together and I don’t want to lose that but it hurts. Just being around him hurts, because I’m not really  _ with  _ him. If that makes sense.”

Bitty made sure he was at a stopping point before coming over to Dex and sitting with him at the table. “It makes perfect sense. You don’t want to risk what you have, but you’re not sure if you can take not having more for much longer.”

They nodded together, commiserating over their shared experience in silence before Bitty decided: “Screw that.”

“What?” Dex blinked, not used to Bitty’s sharp tone.

“Screw that,” Bitty repeated. “Look, Nurse clearly likes being around you. He wouldn’t choose to spend so much time with you if he wasn’t interested in you, at least as a friend. And he clearly didn’t know you were gay until this week. I think you should go for it.”

Dex spluttered, clearly not expecting to hear this from Bitty.

“No, I’m serious. Neither one of us should be sitting here feeling sorry for ourselves. It’s Valentine’s Day, it’s Nursey’s birthday, and if there’s even a chance that we could have a relationship with the person we love, don’t we owe it to ourselves to at least try?”

Dex leaned back in his chair, a look of determination sweeping across his face. “Yeah. You’re right. I’ve got somewhere I need to be, I think.”

“Here,” Bitty said, standing to grab two finished tarts from where they were cooling. “Take these. If it goes well, you guys can eat them together. If it doesn’t, then you get both to yourself. Not that I don’t think it’s going to go well!”

“Thanks, Bits,” Dex chuckled, accepting the tupperware with a shy smile. “Wish me luck.”

“As if you’ll need it,” Bitty said. “Just wait until he sees that smile directed his way - that boy will be a puddle at your feet.”

He watched Dex walk resolutely out of the Haus and smiled to himself. His smile faded when he remembered how Jack had reacted up in his room, like there was nothing between them at all.

___

Jack stayed in his room for a few minutes after Bitty left, thinking through the past few days. He did enjoy Bitty’s company and his friendship, but if he was being honest with himself it was probably more than that. He turned the rose over and over in his hand, rolling the stem between his fingers. He could hear the rest of the Haus starting to get ready for the party later tonight, both to celebrate Nursey’s birthday and Valentine’s Day. Ransom and Holster had returned with the keg, but Jack wasn’t quite ready to join in the fray yet.

He looked at the rose one last time and stood, walking over to Shitty’s room, knocking lightly on the doorframe. He knew at this point that there wasn’t even the illusion of privacy in the Haus, especially where Shitty was concerned, but he liked to pretend.

“Why, Jacques,” Shitty crooned from where he was sitting on the bed, Lardo’s feet in his lap. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

Jack hesitated for second, glancing at Lardo, before figuring she probably already knew anyway. “I think Bitty’s upset about the rose.”

Lardo rolled her eyes and went back to drawing on Shitty’s bed frame with a ballpoint pen.

“This is completely unexpected,” Shitty said, deadpan, “and completely new information. Because we didn’t both hear Bitty full-naming you mere minutes ago.”

Jack huffed. “Okay, you don’t need to be dicks.”

“Take pity on the boy, Shits,” Lardo said, not looking up from her masterpiece. “He clearly doesn’t understand what he’s put poor Bits through.”

Jack frowned. He could tell Bittle was upset, and he didn’t like thinking that he was the one that caused it.

“What exactly did Bits say?” Shitty asked. “Give us the deets, and don’t leave anything out.”

Jack goes through their short conversation, trying to remember everything that he’d said and that Bitty had done. He knew he’d fucked up; he could never find the right thing to say to Bitty. He just didn’t know what he could do to fix it.

When he finished telling his story, Lardo sighed and capped her pen. “Jack, you do realize that Bitty feels like you’ve forgotten about him, right?”

Jack’s brows furrowed. “You really think he thinks I just forgot to write him a note?”

“Uh, chyeah,” Shitty said, raising an eyebrow. “Jack, think about it. You gave the entire team roses saying thanks for all our hard work and then Bitty just gets a plain rose. It definitely feels like an afterthought.”

“Shit,” Jack said, running a hand over his face and through his hair. “It definitely does, doesn’t it?” He knew that Bitty still had trouble feeling like he was contributing to the team, and he knew that he was one of the reasons that Bitty had ever felt like that to begin with; he’d just thought he had been doing better about showing Bitty that he appreciates him - more than appreciates him. This whole thing was supposed to make him happy, not hurt him. “What do I do?”

Lardo rested a hand on Shitty’s shoulder and looked at him for confirmation. “If I may? I’ve got an idea.”

Shitty smiled and nodded. Both of their eyes were twinkling mischievously; Jack wasn’t sure he was going to like what was about to happen.

___

Bitty was laying the tarts out on cake tray so that they would be ready for the party later when he heard someone enter the kitchen behind him. “Before you ask, the rest of these are for the party. You can have one then.”

“Uh. I didn’t actually come for tarts.”

Bitty spun around to see Jack standing in the doorway of the kitchen looking sheepish and holding a single red rose. “Oh. Um, what- what did you come here for?”

Jack steeled himself and Bitty watched him walk across the room with the same amount of focus and commitment that he typically saved for on the ice. “I brought you your rose. You left it in my room.”

“Oh,” Bitty said, blushing slightly and reminding himself that it was useless to get his hopes up with this boy. “You didn’t have to do that, Jack.”

“I just thought, you deserve to know how much I appreciate you,” Jack said, eyes fixed on the rose in his hand instead of on Bitty’s expression. “I didn’t want you to feel like I didn’t appreciate you as much as I do the other guys.”

Bitty smiled lightly, ignoring the swell in his chest at Jack’s words. “Well, are you going to hand it over, or do I have to answer a riddle first?”

Jack cracked a forced smile at the chirp. “I wrote you a note,” he said, the words rushed. “It’s not that I forgot to before, or whatever, I actually got yours first, and, well- here.”

Bitty reached forward to take the rose that Jack was holding into the space between them, somehow acting like it was both an olive branch and a grenade. “You really didn’t have to,” he said, finding it hard to look away from Jack’s eyes, overwhelmingly blue in the light of the Haus kitchen.

“I wanted to,” Jack said. For once he didn’t shrug, or try and shrink back from expressing real emotion. Bitty was starting to think the people who called Jack a hockey robot just didn’t know him well enough. He looked down at the note and couldn’t stop the little gasp he let out at what was written.

_ Roses are red, violets are blue,  _

_ I’m at my best when I’m with you _ .

_ Happy Valentine’s Day. Love, Jack _

Bitty stood stock still, completely unsure about how he should react. “Jack-”

“Can I just-” Jack broke off, taking a deep breath. “I want to explain.”

Bitty nodded silently, allowing Jack the space to say what he needed to say.

“Sometimes, when I’m out around campus, or even at home, I’ll see something and it’ll just… remind me of you,” Jack begins, and Bitty has a feeling that this’ll be the most he’s ever seen Jack talk all at once outside of his role as a captain. “I never really thought about why, but it seemed to make you happy so I just kept doing it. And when I saw the roses, I just bought one for you, thinking that it would make you happy. I didn’t realize until later that you might be freaked out by it, or that the team might see it and take it the wrong way. Only it turned out that it would be the right way, I guess. So it wasn’t that I wrote everyone else a note and then forgot yours or anything like that. Their roses were mostly just to cover up the fact that I bought you one, and I was nervous that I was, I dunno, giving too much away.”

Bitty waited a second, making sure Jack was done. His heart was hammering in his chest at what he thought Jack was trying to say. “So why give me a note now?”

Jack smiled nervously. “I really like you, Bittle. And if Shitty is to be believed, then today is the day to do stupid shit like make grand declarations of love.”

Bitty was fairly certain that his heart stopped. “Love?” he choked out.

Jack’s eyes widened. “Oh, no, um, well, not no, but that’s too fast, I know it is and- I was just-”

Bitty listened to Jack fumble for a second before deciding there was something better that Jack could be doing with his mouth.

It took Jack a moment to adjust; one second, he thought he had ruined everything and the next, he had an armful of Bitty and he was being kissed within an inch of his life. Once that moment passed however, he responded enthusiastically, throwing himself into the kiss and tightening his arms around Bittle’s waist. Bitty kissed like he did everything: enthusiastically and with all of himself, wrapping his arms around Jack’s shoulders and pushing his hands up into Jack’s hair in a way that sent shivers down Jack’s spine. It was clear Bittle had been waiting for this at least as long as Jack had and he wasn’t about to let a second go to waste.

Jack knew how he felt. He had never thought he would get to have this, that he would graduate and leave Bittle behind to do amazing things and to find someone else to spend his life with. And while that still might happen one day, Jack’s not that much of an idealist, he’ll get to have this in his life at least for a little while, and that was more than he had ever hoped.

Jack cursed his need for oxygen for forcing him to break the kiss, but when he pulled back and saw the expression on Bittle’s face he was immediately thankful that he got a chance to see it.

Bitty was always attractive; Jack had fallen in love with his carefree smiles and kind eyes, but this smile was something new entirely. His whole face glowed with the joy of it, and Jack felt like he’d been knocked into the boards, all the air pushed out of his chest. He got to have this; he would get to see this smile again, if he was lucky.  _ And you deserve it _ , a little voice that sounded suspiciously like Shitty said in in the back of his mind.

Bitty was staring up at Jack, that same smile playing across his lips. “Jack Zimmermann. Who would’ve pegged you for the romantic type?”

Jack rolled his eyes and laughed good-naturedly. “Well, you do so much for me - for everyone - I figured it was time someone did something for you. And full disclosure, Lardo helped me write the poem.”

Bitty laughed and blushed at the idea of Jack and Lardo working together to figure out a way for Jack to tell Bitty that he- that he  _ loved _ him. That was going to take a while to wrap his head around.

As if on cue, the rest of the Samwell Men’s Hockey Team came thundering down the stairs, dressed for the party.

“I smell cake, BItty, and I know those tarts are ready,” Holster’s voice echoed throughout the kitchen and Jack and Bitty grudgingly separated so that Bitty could stop Nursey’s cake from being eaten before he even got there.

Lardo and Shitty followed Ransom and Holster, shooting Jack a knowing look when they spotted the flush on Bitty’s cheeks. Chowder poked his head in and soon joined in on the festivities, complementing Bitty’s baking, who preened at the attention.

Jack smiled and looked around, realizing that this team had become his family in a way he had never expected. It was bittersweet, knowing he would leave them soon, but these moments were worth it. 

Nurse and Dex came in the door, taking off their coats and enjoying the warmth of the house. If Dex had thought his collar would hide the deep purple hickey over his pulse, he was sorely mistaken, and the conversation quickly turned to chirping Dex for getting some action on Valentine’s Day. If Jack hadn’t been so absorbed with meeting Bitty’s eyes from across the crowded kitchen and reveling in the smile Bitty sent his way, he would have noticed the disgusting amount of pride in Nursey’s expression every time someone brought up the hickey.

Bitty corralled the team, getting them together so they could light the candles and sing happy birthday to Nurse. Jack could hardly tear his eyes away the whole time, noting how the light from the candles made Bitty’s skin glow and his eyes sparkle and suddenly, he couldn’t wait for the party to start so that he could steal Bitty away without them being missed.

Later they would discuss the hard parts: what this means for them when Jack goes to Providence, how they were going to handle the team and their parents and the world. Later, they would define the relationship and figure out what it meant to be together, not just emotionally, but physically. But for now, they could celebrate with their friends, content in the knowledge that they had found a date for Valentine’s Day, even if no one else knew.

Sometime in the future, a long time from now, but not as long as one might think, Jack will give Bitty another rose. It won’t have a note again, but it just might might come along with a ring and the promise of a future together.

**Author's Note:**

> For those curious, the cake Bitty makes is this one: http://southernbite.com/best-strawberry-sheet-cake/  
> It's something I grew up eating for Valentine's and it's delicious (I actually just pulled it out of the oven, too).
> 
> (I might write a companion to this about Dex and Nursey, so keep a look out)


End file.
